British Government watched too much Lie To Me, start hiring trained "Spotters"

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mrk

mrk

mrk

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What a waste of money, oh wait...

CopyPasta from Slash:
Slashdot.org said:
An anonymous reader writes, "The Economist's Gulliver reports on a story in Nature that questions the current airport security regimen," excerpting: "Over the past four years, some 3,000 officers in America's Transportation Security Administration (TSA) have been specially trained to spot potential terrorists at airports. The programme, known as SPOT, for Screening Passengers by Observation Technique, is intended to allow airport security officers to use tiny facial cues to identify people who are acting suspiciously. The British government is currently launching a new screening regime modelled on the Americans' SPOT. There's just one problem with all this: there's no evidence that SPOT is actually effective. The whole thing is mostly based on pseudoscience, Sharon Weinberger reports in Nature."

Happily, Nature's original article is available in full, rather than paywalled.
Click to expand...

Here's the full article.

So they're using Micro Expressions to tell when someone could be acting suspiciously in a terrorist manner.

The men who stare at goats would turn in their grave if they were real* :o

*They probably are/were real, damn Americans!

I understand micro expressions can be useful but more in a controlled environment (interview/interrogation etc) instead of a permanently busy environment with people of all types such as an airport - expressions would just be too easy to miss and when one Spotter thinks someone is acting suspiciously when they're not what will they do about the actual terrorist who blends in perfectly with every other person in the airport?

The article tells of all this being based on Paul Ekman's research in the 70s but since that era his newer work has not been peer reviewed.
 
So they are hiring people to spot people who look a bit shifty.. say.. anxious... maybe even a little bewildered or even angry...

Because you never get worried, lost and angry people in airports.
 
SiriusB said:
So they are hiring people to spot people who look a bit shifty.. say.. anxious... maybe even a little bewildered or even angry...

Because you never get worried, lost and angry people in airports.
Click to expand...

:p very true! my mum is all of those things when we are due to fly out.

I bet thats really a cover to check out more muslims passing through!
 
I don't know why, but I always seem to look shifty when I'm buying alcohol in a shop. It's really weird, I feel panic setting in, then I keep making too much eye contact and don't know where to look.

This results in me getting ID'd (which of course, I don't mind at all)

If I've had a pint or so before hand, my dutch courage increases my alcohol buying confidence and I never get asked for ID :p

My girlfriend says I go really red when I'm in the queue as I approach the till :D
 
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